A portion of the second floor ended up in their neighbor's yard. In the debris, the Stones found a closet that contained the original floorplans.

Armed with the diagram and hard lessons learned post-Katrina, the family rebuilt.

"We prepared for everything we think would happen in a redo of Katrina," Ben Stone said.

The house is made of walls a foot wide, windows that can withstand 200 mph winds, and sports steel beams that tunnel into the ground.

"This is a special place for us. We like to get up in the morning, and first thing I do is look out to the Gulf. It gets angry from time to time, but it's the most beautiful sight I see," Stone said. "I was not going to live the rest of my life without coming back here."

The vacant lot next door is where Sissy Leatherman's mother used to live.